Notes from the Underground Volume 1 Number 5 - MayDay photo album. Well, to some it was another boring Monday, but to me, Crazy Pete, it was a day to speak out against the globalizing, homogenizing, racist and environmentally-destructive forces that be. Wait a second! That's just another boring Monday to me too, except I don't usually have news cameras and journalists scrambling to record my every word. Also, though there are always helicopters looming overhead and trucks of tear gas on stand-by, waiting for a chance to make this grown man cry, somehow, when ya get about a thousand people together, it's just a little more fun. Like a family reunion or something, yet with the imminent possibility of arrest. Come to think of it, I guess that's like any ol' regular Crazy Pete family reunion. Okay, a difference is that there were lots of cute lady Reds in Ché Guevera tank tops. And my old man wasn't there arguing with Uncle Phil about the lemon Honda Civic Phil sold him. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I had a great time joining my comrades-in-arm (and bandanna) at Chicago's May Day march and rally. And even though I didn't get arrested (only two at our event did, and I felt their attempt to seize the American flag at Daley Plaza to be amateurish, clichéd and not even entertaining in a retro kind of way), the day was not an entire bust... I ran into this buddy of mine who owed me ten bucks, so that was cool. Also, this foxy reporter with CBS news was kind of giving me the eye (which my before-mentioned buddy confirmed), so, who knows? Maybe next time around, your ol' bachelor friend will have a lady friend to write about. Could be, you know? Anyway, since I couldn't get a date, and since no one seemed to want to arrest me, I thought I'd break out the old Yashika and snap a few pix. So on with the slide show... That tiny blip toward the left center of the photo is usually the first thing I see when I look up to the sky. It's a bird!?! It's a plane!?! It's a 'copter. Yep, trailing me like a bad case of body odor. Welcome to my world. Another familiar sight to Crazy Pete: A whole gaggle of Johnny Law types. Notice the guy in the middle with the little puff of white haze around his mouth? No, it wasn't cold... He was smoking' a stogie. Chicago's finest. Need I say more? Now's when things start getting fun. The young and babushka-ed standing in front of the Chicago Board of Trade, hoping to convert traders with Mao's Little Red Book. No one was too interested in appearing in my Little Black Book. Sigh. More sign-carryin', disenchanted types. Moving down Michigan Avenue - Look! It's the Babushka Brigade again! Yoo-hoo! The one on the right sort of looks like a Superhero, doesn't she? Cool. All right. A crowd has begun to gather because Crazy Pete promised to do a striptease in honor of May Day. Just kidding. The crowd gathered because, well, it was gathering time. And again. Time for a little crowd warm-up care of the Radical Cheerleaders. With their chants against Disney and Nike sweatshops, they're a long way from the Waukegan High Pep Squad's, "We've got spirit, yes we do! We've got spirit, how 'bout YOU?!?" They rocked. A Radical Cheerleader shakin' her groove thing. If my high school were this cool, man, I'd a probably hung out a little longer. It was cool to see some people with an enviro message. Kind of rare, but, well, what can ya do? More coppers. I wanna know how many skulls I gotta break to get to have someone paid to follow me around with an umbrella. On second thought, never mind. All right, it's the big ol' puppet guy! The anarchist in black is my old buddy Sunflower. No, wait a minute, that's Rabbit. No, wait...Actually I have no idea who that is. Good work, dude! And it's the parade... Previous Notes from the Underground Next Notes from the Underground